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Saturday, November 29, 2014

I had met him first when I had moved into a different
school while in eighth standard. Being the class leader, when he came forward
to ask my name, I had blushed pathetically. In my previous school, a boy talking
to a girl was considered scandalous and we avoided the boys like plague. In this
uptown school, the boys mingled with girls freely. Soon, I too shed all my
inhibitions and made so many new friends, half of them boys.

I don’t know when I fell in love with him. When I
realized that I was in love, I was already drowning in a madness, which the
love I felt for him, showered on me. I didn’t bother to think whether he loved
me or not. Secretly, I let my love for him bloom like thousand sunflowers that
followed single mindedly the radiant sun.

During some rare moments, I felt he returned my love.
When his eyes wandered to meet mine while our English teacher was teaching us a
love story, I wondered whether he was thinking about us as the couple in the story,
the way I was visualizing it. When he usually sat near me in the library, which
was always near empty, I assured myself, he wanted to be near me in the same
way I craved for his presence. When we met on the road to our school regularly,
I thought he loved me. He never stopped but passed slowly by on his bicycle addressing
me with a whisper of my name and a smile. In those moments, there was that same
twinkle in his eyes, which I often found reflected in mine, when my thoughts
wandered to him while I sat in front of the mirror. It made me believe that he
was falling in love with me.

In those moments, it was as if time had frozen. Even
all my senses would freeze then. The only thing that I remembered was the
overwhelming awareness of his presence. We hardly exchanged any words other
than a smile in those moments. Never in those years did I manage to speak more
than a few words to him. When he saw me, he would say my name in a whisper, and
that was it. I chose to believe that it was because he used it as a pun. My
name meant love. I wished to believe that he used that single word to
say that I was his love.

Time flew after school and six years later when we met
again at our school campus for a get together, he was a changed person and so
was I. His once cute face had acquired a serious look with the presence of stubble.
I found it hard to believe that once upon a time, I had loved him so madly that
my every breath sang his name. I was searching for the boy I had fallen in love
with. The one who still lingered in the depths of my heart and had never allowed
anyone else to enter.

When he came near me and whispered my name in the same
way that he used to do years ago, I realized I had never stopped loving him. We
spent hours talking and he told me his postgraduate examinations had just got
over.

“Does my look scare you? I didn’t even have time to
shave if I had to reach here on time. My last exam was yesterday,” he said,
while he ran his fingers nervously over his stubble.

I sighed in relief that it was not his regular look.

Next day, when he arrived to pick me up for the dinner
date I had agreed to, he looked dashing in a white T-shirt and blue jeans. His
unsightly stubble was gone. His boyish charm together with his athletic looks
almost took my breath away then and there. I was in danger of becoming the
stammering teen once again.

When during the unusually long dinner he confessed that
he had fallen in love with me on the day that I had joined school, I felt tears
burning at the back of my eyes. I managed to avow my feelings using words that
were threatening to fade away from my memory. After a long walk home, he
gathered me in his arms vowing that he would never allow me to go away again.

After I agreed to be his forever love, when he whispered my name , he confessed that he had always meant it as a pun.

I live in a village in the outskirts of a big city. I
need not tell you the name of the city or my village. That is because the
incident that I want to narrate is not the story of my village alone. It is the
story of hundreds of thousands of villages all over India.

When you live in a village that lies in the outskirts
of a big city, there are advantages and disadvantages. We are just a stone
throw away from all the glitz and glamour of a thriving metropolitan city. The
vibes of excitement comes floating to our little village too.

All was well until a few years ago. On a fateful day,
our village zamindars agreed to allow the municipality of the big city to use a
barren land in our village as a garbage dump. That was the death knoll on us.
Initially, we were not concerned as the area was far away from the main areas
of our village. Soon, the stinking pile of waste started creating havoc in our lives.
It started polluting the water in the nearby river, which was the main source
for our farm irrigation and drinking water for our cattle. Ground water also
became toxic soon. Death started its ominous dance and very soon, our village
transformed from the serene heaven to a graveyard. The rich moved away from the
village, leaving us less privileged to deal with the situation.

I study in the city. With encouragement and help from
my college mates, I decided to bring together the people of my village to
protest against using our village as a garbage dump. We too had the right to
live a happy and healthy life. We had remained silent victims for long. I understood
that silence kills.

Kyuki Bin Bole Ab Nahi
Chalega #AbMontuBolega.

I started the campaign along with a few other youngsters.
We went from house to house creating awareness about the dangers of the garbage
that was being dumped everyday into our village. Very soon, the entire village
joined in and a few brave ones started a non-violent hunger strike against the municipality
authorities of the great city to help us.

We blocked the dump trucks that came everyday and sent
them back even when the police threatened us with lathis and water bullets. The
voice of the village could not be suppressed for long and the Supreme Court
ordered the municipality authorities to take actions to clean the area and
restore it to livable conditions. We got support from environmentalists all
over the country and even from the World Health Organization whom we had
approached.

It was then that we realized the power of our voices.

Join us in this campaign and
raise your voice against any atrocity that you find dominating your society. Many
Montus out there remain silent spectators.

Be a part of #AbMontuBolega
campaign, began by Strepsils, where we are raising our voice against many
social evils.

Be it cleanliness,
homosexuality, female infanticide, discrimination based on colour, domestic
violence, rape, speaking about social taboos, gender inequalities or animal
abuse. In our country, there exist issues against which we need to raise our
voice. Let us campaign against all the vices that exist in our nation.

Thursday, November 27, 2014

My phone had three missed calls when I got up. It was
from my former colleague Asha who had taken a sabbatical from work to look
after her toddler son. Asha was one of my best friends and I called back
immediately.

“Shalini, I called you because I thought you might be
interested in what my sister-in-law is doing. She has become a past life
regression expert and she is doing it for free for the first six months of her
training period,” said Asha, after our regular girly talks.

“Of course, dear, I am interested. You know how much I
believe in reincarnation and past lives. May be, I can find a reason why I get
those weird dreams,” I said, eager to embark on a mystical journey.

Asha’s sister-in-law Maya contacted me soon and she
asked me to meditate regularly and write down the main question that I wished
to get an answer from the past life regression therapy.

My biggest problem was that I dreamt about a male colleague
regularly and that too as my lover whereas I didn’t even like him in real life.
It disturbed me.Though he was friendly with me and sought me out regularly for
leisurely chats during lunch breaks at office, I had never felt anything akin
to love for him.

During regression, she instructed me to visit the past life,
which held answer to my most pertinent question. What I saw then stunned me.

In the past life I visited, I was living in a huge
house in the north of England, during early eighteenth century. I worked as a
governess to a ten-year-old girl, the youngest sister of the master of the
house, Sir Stephen Winthrop. He was a Baron and the moment I saw him, I understood
the reason why I dreamt of Arjun so much. It was Arjun except that in that
incarnation he looked absolutely dashing in his clean-shaven avatar. Arjun
sported a beard and looked unkempt in his current life.

I watched how the master of the house fell in love with
me and married me ignoring all the societal rules. He loved me so much and
happily, we made promises to be together forever. But we died in a carriage
accident soon after the tenth birthday of our first born. We had lived a life
full of love. There hadn’t been a moment of sadness or anger from the moment I
met him.

It explained my dreams. It explained why I saw dreams
of a happily ever after with Arjun. Though the veil of time had erased the
memories from my conscious mind, my subconscious mind, my soul, still cherished
the love we had once shared.

I knew what I had to do. I had to try once more to get
back that love.

While returning home, I messaged to Arjun requesting
him to meet up at a nearby cafeteria. As fate would have it, I immediately fell
in love with the person who entered the cafeteria. Arjun was clean-shaven and
hence looked exactly like my love from my past life, Sir Stephen Winthrop.

My love must have reflected in my eyes because Arjun
appeared tense. I tried to gather my wits to make Arjun feel at ease. He
surprised me with what he told me next.

“I have waited so long to see that look in your eyes,
Shalini. You ruled my dreams and showered love. But in real life, you never
even acknowledged my presence. I was going mad with frustration.”

So after a centuries of being apart two souls re-united
that day. When I confessed about my past life experience, Arjun fell silent but
continued to stare at me with love twinkling in his eyes. During those moments
of silence, our souls re-connected and renewed the vows of a forever.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

When I came to know about the Blog to feed a child
activity, I was determined to write as many posts as possible. Words have
magic. It can alter your mood, take you to fantasy worlds or give you
satisfaction of a venting your feelings when you put them on paper. That my
words would help feed a child for an entire academic year was an opportunity I
would never want to miss.

Children are the most beautiful creations of God. They are
the only human beings capable of giving unconditional love. When you feed a
child, he/she becomes your fan instantly. Nothing can give me as much pleasure
as the smile on the face of a child whom I had given food.

I was a fussy eater when I was small and many
afternoons I would remain hungry because my lunch box did not satisfy my
hunger. The food was cold and perhaps tasteless as it was filled into it hours
before. Because of this same reason, many of my classmates shared the same
hunger pangs that I was going through. A plate of steaming hot and tasty food
would have been a dream- come- true for us then. I still remember how classmates
drooled upon a tiffin box filled with appetizing food.

Our school was situated in front of an auditorium and
by afternoon the smell of feast would waft in and our stomachs would start to
growl. My one classmate used to joke that she breathed in the aroma of tasty
food while eating her cold tasteless food. Some brave boys would butter the
cook of the auditorium who would give kheer or papads to satisfy them.

On the rare occasions when one of us had to attend a
function there, there would be many ready to accompany us. On those days
classroom hunger would vanish.

If someone would serve my child hot tasty food everyday
at school, he won’t create the tantrums that he act out in the mornings.
There won’t be growling stomachs or hungry faces in classrooms. The
Akshayapatra organization has this as mission. It aims to end classroom hunger.

Blogadda together with the Akshaya Patra organization promises
to feed a child per blogpost that the bloggers registered with them submit. I
request my fellow bloggers to take up this activity to feed a hungry child with
an aim to end classroom hunger.

Khoobsurat directed by Shashanka Ghosh with Sonam
Kapoor and Fawad Khan as the lead pair was a huge disappointment for me.

I watched it, loaded with expectations. It was a Disney
venture, had the very good looking Fawad Khan as a Prince and the cute and
sweet Sonam Kapoor was the Disney Princess. I could not forgive the weak
script, forgettable music and un-tapped talents of the leading pair. Screenplay
was poor. The script too was pathetic. Except for the lone redeeming feature in
the form of a cameo performance by Kirron Kher as the adorable Manju, none of
the characters stayed in my mind after the movie ended.

The most
pathetic thing was Fawad Khan looked like a vagabond wearing suit, instead of
being the handsome Prince Charming. He looks best when he is clean –shaven. He then
acquires the oh-so-irresistible look, which made him the hero in a million
hearts. That is the kind of the ideal look, which would have made the Prince in
Khoobsurat rock. Just like the very popular serial Humsafar, Khoobsurat too
would have succeeded across borders. Look at the way he looks when he is clean-shaven.

Throughout the movie, I wanted to ask him #WillYouShave
please! Why oh why do the directors do such things? Most of the good-looking
actors appear grouchy when they sport beards and moustaches. For a role that
demanded him to look dapper and dashing, he should have shaved. Period.

In Humsafar, he had the role of a Yale educated rich
businessman. In that role he was drop-dead gorgeous with his clean-shaven looks
and romantic acting. His mushy dialogues were enough to make any sensitive girl
swoon.

It was an instance when his well-groomed looks ensured
that he struck gold with the opportunity given to him. It won him a huge fan- Me!

The dialogues in Khoobsurat between the lead pair were
forgettable and nowhere did I hear a memorable dialogue. The pathetic attempts
at creating humor flopped. I had thought of quitting mid way. But the
enticement that Fawad may appear clean shaven any moment remained the only glue
that proved effective. But I was disappointed.

Please please Fawad, if you want a super hit, enter Bollywood only with your clean-shaven look.

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Shraddha was giving final changes to the
commissioned painting of a couple kissing in moonlight. The person who had
ordered the painting wanted to gift it to his fiancée on her birthday, which
was just a day away. The client would arrive in the evening to collect the
painting.

The kissing couple on her canvas was reminiscent of the
passion that was once part of her own life. Ravi and Shraddha were busy building
their careers. Both of them hardly saw each other and even slept in separate
bedrooms as their schedules clashed with each other.

Ravi was often away on business tours and Shraddha
would spend hours in her home studio bringing images to life on her canvas with
lines and colors, working late into the night. The color from their life had
drained off unnoticed with the vagaries of life. When they met, at least one of
them would be exhausted by the activities of a busy day. With a peck on the
cheek, which had become the only physical contact between them, both would
allow the other person to rest.

Logging in to her email to send the confirmation mail
to the client, a mail from Ravi caught her attention. It was unusual. He rarely
mailed her. When she opened it, the mail contained only a link to a video on YouTube.
It was the link to the #BringBackTheTouch
TV commercial of Parachute Advanced Body lotion.

By the time she finished watching the TVC, her cheeks
had become wet with tears. Ravi had indirectly told her what was missing from
their lives - the magic of touch! It was time to re-ignite the lost spark of
passion.

That day when Ravi entered their house, the whole house
was sparkling in the light of a thousand candles. With a heart that pulsed with
delight, Ravi looked around for Shraddha. She was nowhere around. A note on the
dining table invited him to a magical evening with his ‘little minx’, the name he had given to Shraddha during their
courtship period. Ravi’s face lit up with a huge smile.

Shraddha entered the dining room then carrying a heart
shaped chocolate cake, with ‘For a new beginning’ written on it
with icing. Dressed in a red sari that clung to her curves, she was as
beautiful as ever. Ravi yearned to gather her into his arms. He waited until they cut the cake together and
fed each other, before doing just that.

“I feared I had lost you forever, darling!” whispered
Ravi.

“ Sorry, Ravi. Forgive me for being so selfish. Forgive
me for forgetting the vows we had made to each other. And thank you for making
me realize what was missing from our lives,” said Shraddha, caressing his cheeks.

When Ravi cupped her face and captured her lips in a
passionate kiss, it marked the beginning of the magic of touch re-entering
their lives.

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Only the one who has experienced it knows the pang of
hunger. In Mahabharata, we come across the Akshaya Patra, which ensured a
never-ending supply of food to the Pandavas who were in exile. Given to
Yudhisthira by Lord Surya, to facilitate him to feed the many number of sages
and members of his family, the Akshaya Patra was a boon to the Pandavas.

If we had such a vessel that could end the food needs of
today, there won’t be hunger deaths in any corner of the earth. Everywhere
there would be happy faces. there won’t be greed, there won’t be wars, there
won’t be enmity. Love will reign throughout the world.

When you feed a child, not only do you help him grow,
but also you are molding a happy and contented future citizen of the world.
There is an greater eagerness in the child to learn and also energy to give a
better output.

But how can we end classroom hunger?

Classroom hunger will end when there is provision for a
delicious mid day meal in every school. Every kid no matter in which age group
he belong, eats well with his peers. They will compete with each other to
finish their meal and will stop being the fussy eater that they usually are in
the confines of their home. When they learn the happiness of eating the same
food as everyone else in his class, there is a sense of equality as well among
the kids.

In a school I know run by a charitable mission, they
provide mid day meal and the meal is cooked by the parents who volunteer each
day in the kitchen along with the school kitchen staff. This ensures
cleanliness and efficiency in the system of the activity. This can be adopted by other schools as well.

There has been instances when government agencies in
charge of providing mid day meal ate up the money provide for the mid day meal
and then provided low quality food to the kids. There have been even deaths due
to food poisoning during the lunch hour.

The Akshay Patra, just like the legendary vessel of the
Pandavas, is doing commendable work to ensure an end to classroom hunger. It
has succeeded to ensure that its feeding capacity doesn’t end. With the help of
volunteers and kind hearted people, the Akshay Patra mission which began with a
handful of schools , has become a strong presence in the struggle
to end classroom hunger by feeding an estimated 1.3 million children across
India.

Watch this video to learn about Akshay Patra.

This blog post is intended to help to feed a child for
a full year. Blogadda, one of the largest online community for bloggers in
India has taken up the initiative to donate an Akshay Patra beneficiary for
each blog post that is written for the cause by the registered bloggers.

Fellow bloggers, do your bit and help feed a hungry
child for an entire academic year.Each blogger can write five posts. You have
the capability to feed five kids for an entire year. Do take up this noble
cause.

When I visited the website of Porcelanosaand went
through the products offered by them, it was as though they had peeped into my dreams
while creating their products. Their products for the bathrooms were exactly
what I would have picked for my dream home. Indiblogger asked to pick as many items that caught my eye. Promising not to be greedy, I selected five items for my bathroom. All the items are fabulous, they have products for the whole home. Stylish wall tiles, floor tile, Kitchen products, bedroom, living room and bathroom products which can beautify your dream home.

For me, bathroom is a place of rejuvenation, a place where I wash away the grime of a tiresome day and prepare for a new beginning. For the same reason, I want the bathroom in my dream home to be my personal heaven- a place, which is a treat to the eyes, as well as an epitome of comfort and quality. It should be aesthetic as well as classic. It should be a pleasure to enter.Instead of being a cleaning or beauty ritual, the bath time should be an indulgence.

The first thing that will catch your eye when you enter
my dream bathroom will be a classical Victorian style bathtub made out of cast
iron with an enamel finish. Though the one in the picture above has its
external side colored black, I would select the option of white enameled
exterior, which they provide in their design options. The choice of my colour
for the decorative legs would be a golden finish, again one that they have as a
choice in design. Then it would have a complete royal look. I would then be
able to indulge in luxurious, scented, bubble baths to relax and tone my
tired body, while reading a book or listening to music.

The second thing that you will notice will be the sleek
and stylish basin. I selected it because I plan to add a storage cabin for
cleaning products beneath it. It is serviceable as well due to the provision of
a surface to place beauty products, soaps etc.

The fourth item in my bathroom is a companion for item
three - the shower screen. I wish to keep my bathroom dry and hygienic all the
time. The presence of a shower curtain eliminates the chance of water spilling
onto the entire bathroom floor. It would help to separate the dry area from the wet area. It is
aesthetic in appeal as well.

The fifth item is the best among all. The design is so
aesthetic that the toilet can pass off as a ceramic chair. The design also
makes cleaning easier and seems comfortable as well. Being wall mounted, the
outlet pipes are not visible and that adds to the visual appeal.
Furthermore, the model offers eco mechanisms that saves up to 25% of water
compared to standard systems. Is there anything else that one could wish for in
a toilet?

So folks, I am busy dreaming and planning about my
dream home at 24Kliving equipped with Porcelenosa products. If you liked the products that I picked, click on the links below the photos to go to the respective pages at the Porcelanosa website.

Monday, November 17, 2014

More than six decades have passed after India gained
independence. We have sent a satellite to Mars, is home to some of the most
brilliant brains in the whole world and the richest in our country occupy the
top rung among billionaires of the world.

Still nearly 130 million households lack proper
sanitation facilities and people are forced to defecate in the open. The unhygienic
conditions that prevail in the public toilets that are present in many areas
also drive people to seek a spot of clean ground out in the open to answer
nature’s call.

While driving to my native place, we have to pass
through many rural areas and kids defecating in the open, beside the roads and
railway lines are a common sight.

We go on travels by road and the worst problem that a
female travelling by road in India face is the absence of clean toilets. Most
of the public toilets are in dilapidated condition and are terrible stinking hellholes.
I have had to use public toilets while on long travels and they have given me
nightmares for days together. On many occasions, we search out the good hotels
or restaurants in the area just to answer the calls of nature. Even pay and use
toilets do not cater to my sensibilities.

In India, the general theory is to treat the toilet as
a dump area, which usually will be the worst place in the whole house. The
interior of many houses may speak of splendor and cleanliness, but if you enter
their toilet, you might want to run with your nose pinched closed tightly.

I personally spend time to clean the bathroom and
toilet in my house until it shines. I believe that the health of the
inhabitants of the house depends on the cleanliness practiced in the house. Inside
a toilet, we cleanse our system and our bodies by taking bath. Hence we should
clean our toilets with proper care if we want to maintain a healthy environment
in our home. The toilet should be the cleanest area in any home. Otherwise,
there is a chance of inviting infectious diseases.

Another problem that women face is the lack of clean separate
toilets for women in workplaces. I have come across many women who work in
shops as sales girls drinking very less water to avoid using a toilet. Many use
the same sanitary napkin for more than 10 hours because of inadequate
facilities. Very soon, they damage their health and lose the ability to earn a
living. They instead become burdens to their own family.

School going children too face similar problems. Even schools,
which demand huge donations at the time of admission, fail to provide the basic
hygienic facilities to the kids who spent a majority of their waking hours at
school. I still remember the stinking toilets that we avoided entering while in
school and college. The situation has not changed even a bit.

The presence of malls, which maintain clean toilets,
the restaurants that employ staff 24/7 to maintain hygienic environment need to
be applauded. I have seen foreigners heading to malls just to relieve
themselves after their visits to local attractions. The toilets available in
tourist places are yet another stain to our country. Do I have to mention about
the toilets in our trains, bus stations and railway stations?

It is a welcome relief that our present Prime Minister
has proclaimed that building toilets should be given more priority than
building temples. What I want to see is that plans are put I place to see to
their maintenance. If they are not maintained properly, they would just become
the hub of contagious diseases that people will dread to enter.

Many kids in rural areas fall prey to water borne
diseases like diarrhoea and suffer due to the unhygienic conditions that prevail in their
villages.

Domex has come up with a solution to this.Domex, HUL’s flagship sanitation brand,
currently runs the Domex Toilet Academy (DTA) programme. They build toilets in villages facing the problem of open defecation.

You can bring about the change in the lives of millions of kids, thereby showing your support for the Domex Initiative. All you need to do is “click” on the “Contribute Tab” on www.domex.in and Domex will contribute Rs.5 on your behalf to eradicate open defecation, thereby helping kids like Babli live a dignified life.

Saturday, November 15, 2014

The best hour in school is the lunch hour. No matter
how old you are or how meager your tiffin is, you can’t wait for the lunch hour
to arrive. I can still remember the hunger that raged, the curses we threw at
our teachers who lingered to finish that extra portion that might come for
exam. It was the golden hour for us all in school.

Now years has passed and while I pack the lunch for
my son, I remember my school lunch hours. I feel bad that while I will eat hot
food at home, my son would have to be content with the cold food that would be
there in his tiffin.

But then, he is lucky to have that serving of food.
There are millions of kids who live without having proper food elsewhere in the
world, who would do anything to earn a plate of food. When government schools
started to serve free food to all kids at school, the attendance increased,
because many a kid began to get at least a square meal once in a day. There was
no other scheme that was popular than this scheme.

The happiness that I get when I am able to feed my
family with hot, homely food when their hunger is raging is the best benefit that
I earned from having learned to cook.

The lunch box that I send for my son mostly come
back un-eaten. Mostly because he is a slow eater and also because he likes hot
food. If the school provided, fresh and
healthy food, many students like my son would not have to brave classroom
hunger and wait until the final bell sets them free. The bell sound ends their
hunger too. I have seen kids rushing to nearby cafeterias after school to calm
their raging hunger.

I have seen kids belonging to the lower economic sections
of the society rejoice the opportunity to have to go to school. Most of the
government schools provide mid-day meal, an alluring prospect for many of these
kids.

When hunger pangs disappear, knowledge starts to
enter the brain. Hunger causes distraction and lack of spirits in children.

The Akshaya Patra Foundation is a not-for-profit
organisation headquartered in Bangalore, India. The organisation strives to
fight issues like hunger and malnutrition in India. By implementing the Mid-Day
Meal Scheme in the Government schools and Government aided schools, Akshaya
Patra aims to fight not only hunger but also to bring children to school.

Akshaya Patra and Blogadda have teamed up for a
worldwide blogging competition, to help end classroom hunger!

Participants must send in blogs of at least 300
words on the theme 'How do we eliminate classroom hunger? Imagine what India
would be like if no child goes hungry and an entire generation is educated!

For every blog entry Blogadda will feed one Akshaya
Patra beneficiary for a whole year. The top five blog posts will be featured in
an exclusive series on the Akshaya Patra official blog, and promoted via social
media.

So fellow bloggers, let us join this campaign and
help end classroom hunger.